1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to door latching assemblies for vehicles, especially for motor vehicles like medium and heavy duty trucks and buses, and trailers.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Many motor vehicles use cables to allow the inside and outside door handles to operate the door latches independent of each other. For some motor vehicles, medium and heavy duty trucks for example, the door latching system typically includes inside and outside handles and their handle assemblies which are located remotely to the latch assemblies. The handles attach to cables located within the door. The latch assemblies have latch trip levers connected to the locking mechanism of the latch. Each cable connects to one handle assembly and to the bottom of the latch trip lever of the latch assembly. A rod attaches to the top of the trip lever of both the upper and lower rotary latch assemblies.
To open the door with the inside handle as shown in FIG. 1, for example, the inside handle 150 pulls the upper cable 152 toward itself. The cable 152 in turn pulls the bottom of the trip lever 154 toward the inside handle 150 and upward to unlatch the upper latch assembly 156 from the door. This action also moves the latch rod 158 upward to pull up the top of the trip lever 162 of the lower latch assembly 160, which pulls the bottom of the trip lever upward 162 and moves the cable 153 toward the outside handle 164. This action unlocks the lower latch assembly 160 and unlatches the door.
The door opens with the outside handle in a similar manner. Closing the door reverses the steps.
Unfortunately, the cables can break, rendering the doors inoperable. This makes it difficult to open and repair the door as well if the cable breaks with the door closed. Even when the door can be opened, the door must be disassembled to replace the broken cable.
Therefore, a need exists to provide a mechanism to allow the remote opening of door latches without requiring the use of a cable.